»^'~jiL» j>'> x]> j»':> 






> 3 :> 






_3> ■^:»^^► ■ 





















3>i» :» 



::>2>> 



^ ^.> ,:>5^3» >^>:2>^> :3'->2>. 



:>> ^ 

» 
3> ^ 

J3> > ^ 









- 5 ^^ > >z: 
^^ *3> -:>-»> >Z> ; 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 

PRESENTED BY 



UNITED STATES OP AMERICA. 












]>^>> 



3i>^':3S> >2>.:>-^3^>>>z» 



3 i> _>•-:.> o->,.:3> 3»^ 









:> ^>T> * -' ^A>3 ^ j>3* ■ 3:2§> "3^3 > 3>j: 

^^>> >.>v-^i. 3F>,)33>- '>33 "33; :jl) 
. >5r> >>.>» 3»3 \Z>>>^ :> -^§> ^jg) ,. -^ 
>3- » :>>•-> 3e> > 3i*>^^' 3> ■ 3 ^ ^^ 
^O- > _>^ '-^ ^-^ ■ r^^^'* ;3» ' 3 3^ -:;>^ 

-3 > >■ • - >:>:>>>:> .:i> .2> ::g>^3> 
^:^ > >■• '>:3'::>'::^^::>' ^2> 32».3D) 
■>3 :>=> .^■i ;3r>.- >>5»^:» 3>^^3£>'~:>3> 






-^:35> 3£>':33>' 
^^3 33 ^g> 

>33 ^33; :>1> 



3- > > 

^>> > >■• 

-3 :>. 



3i> :^» 
.1:33 ?^>3 






» :^ "::s>3»' >::>^ 

• >^^ 3»i3» > 30 > j-^ t: 

• >?» ^a^* -> -53> 3>' ^;^>^ 

>3> >>3 ?^30 >J^ T:>3>J 

3S> 3?>v^ 3^ v^^^ 

^ 33>3> ^^ ^> 

:>x> >:»>>:£> ^^^L =^ 

:^5> 3ei>>3> ^i2^ -^-^t^ 

-X3 3i>>2> -^'^ ^^^^ 

>33l> ^igi^3> ^ ^ ^??^ 
>2X> .:::s> ':3> -:^ :^ -^ ^ 

333 ,3'^'3> ^ '/^^^^^ 

:»^^ T»>;:3> .-^* .■■:.l^ -<:i-. ? 
3>3?> 3>>'3 ::i 



3> 135)^33) 3^^i3 :» ' :5> ^^ 



:3^-^ ^ 
^ 3>' : 

-« 3>^ 

^3^ 3» 









^y::!:^^^^ 



3> ;).v-.>S) _3>2> 









^ ; i>^ j:> = 



>j> rt> '^ZB>^'2> :;:¥>::> ^ i:- 



^2> >" ■"^■-S> - 

j»>>^yis> .;5>GS» J:»->-3> ._,^^^3» --_: 



:>o 















X5 -S33^ :>ix: 






2>^:^>i 












5:^ »:^i'^^^.:te%i>>^^:>>:«*^"^>^^l 



'3>>J5>'>- 



>2> :>^ 






OBJECTIONS 



TO 



Public Schools Considered 



REMARKS AT THE ANNUAL MEETING OF 

THE TRUSTEES OF THE PEABODY 

EDUCATION FUND. 



New York, Oct. 7, 1875. 



By BARNAS sears, D.D. 







BOSTON: 

PRESS OF JOHN WILSON AND SON. 

1875. 

r 






At the Annual Meeting of the Trustees of the 
Peabody Education Fund, New York, Oct. 7, 1875, 
it was 

Voted, That the Argument of the General Agent for 
Free Common Schools be pubhshed in the Proceedings 
of the Board, and also that such a number of copies of 
the same as he shall think proper shall be printed, under 
his direction, for general circulation. 



OBJicGnONS 



TO 



PUBLIC SCHOOLS CONSIDERED. 



REMARKS OF DR. SEARS ON SUBMITTING HIS 
ANNUAL REPORT. 

You will have perceived that my Report the present year 
is compressed within narrow limits. I desired to present, 
in connection with it, a somewhat extended statement of 
the views I entertain, after the most careful and anxious 
'consideration, on topics that have been forced upon my at--, 
tention by those who call in question the utility and even / 
the justice of any provision by the State for the education of J 
the people. 

Since our last meeting, the subject of public Free 
Schools has been more fully discussed in the Southern 
States than during any previous year. The protracted 
consideration of the Bill contemplating "mixed schools," 
by both houses of Congress, gave occasion to the oppo- 
nents of popular education to rally their forces and make 
an assault upon the whole system. The defence by th£____ 
State Superintendents and others has been equally ear- 
nest, and much more rational and convincing. No sen- 
sible and careful observer supposes for a moment that the 
Public Schools in any Southern State will be abolished. 
Too many of the people have seen the advantages arising 
from them, even in their incipient stages, to allow such a 
backward step to be taken. They perceive that the ob- 
jections made are, for the most part, speculative, and 
often purely imaginary ; while others, less decided in 
their opinions, think it premature to pass judgment on 
them before the experiment has been fairly tried. The 
main object of the opposition is clearly to avoid the pay- 



J 



ment of the school tax. All other considerations appear 
to be subsidiary to this. 

The most general objection is, that the government has 
no right to tax the people for the education of their 
children. It is here implied that the government con- 
stitutes one party, and the people another, which, in 
republican States, is untrue, both in theory and in 
practice. It is also implied that the acknowledged power 
of taxation vested in the Legislature is so limited as to 
exclude the support of schools, whereas it is a discretionary 
power, which may, indeed, be abused, but for the abuse 
of which a remedy is at hand in the sovereignty of the 
people. Chief-Justice Marshall says, " The people of a 
State give to their government a right of taxing themselves 
and their property ; they prescribe no limits to the exer- 
cise of this right, resting confidently on the interest of the 
Legislature, and the influence of the constituents over 
their representatives, to guard them against its abuse." 
A State Legislature has, therefore, a legal right to tax 
the people for schools. The question then turns on the 
point whether it has a moral right to exercise its consti- 
tutional power in this way. It has been maintained that 
the State has no such right, and roundly asserted that it is 
robbery to take the hard earnings of one man to educate 
the children of another. Abating the exaggeration of the 
statement, and putting it in the proper form, that the 
property of all is taxed for the education of the children 
of all, we would remind those who take this view that 
such was not the opinion of Jefferson, the founder of the 
school of political philosophy to which they profess to 
belong. He prepared a bill, to use his own language, 
"for elementary schools for all the children rich and poor.'' 
" One of the provisions of the bill," he says, " was that the 



expenses of these schools should be borne by the inliabi- 
tants of the county, — every one in proportion to his tax- 
rate." In another place he adds, "It is an axiom in my 
mind that our libert}'^ can never be safe but in the hands 
of the people themselves, and that, too, of the people 
with a certain degree of instruction. This it is the busi- 
ness of the State to effect, and on a general plan." 

The theory of our opponents is, that the government 
should limit itself almost exclusively to the protection of the 
rights of the citizens in their person and property. Their 
motto is, "That government is best which governs least." 
The fact is overlooked that modern society is far removed i 
from primitive simplicity; that, as civilization advances,', 
men are brought into closer relations with each other) 
both individually and collectively : that, as they have 
more wants, so they must have more supplies in common ; 
that, in these circumstances, they derive great advantages 
from organization and combined action, which were im- 
practicable before ; that the man who lived apart from 
others, and could bring his own bucket of water, and 
carry his own lantern, now, that he lives in a community 
where there is a division of labor public and private, 
finds it easier and cheaper to pay his tax for water and 
for gas-lights, and in many ways to employ others to 
do what he once performed with his own hands. The 
regulations of government must increase in number as 
social life becomes more complex. The more progress 
there is in civilization the more concert will there be in 
action. Public economy will come into greater promi- 
nence, and . increased[ demaHd&~-wilL be- inade on the 
government for the exercise of its powers. Excessive 
legislation on some subjects does not prove that there 
should be no legislation in respect to schools. It is only 



against needless or injurious legislation that we should 
be on our guard. For the above-named motto, therefore,' 
we would substitute the following, as much nearer the 
truth and more accordant with reason : Of those things 
which ar,e necessary for the public good, the State should 
perform that and only that which it can do better than 
the individual, and leave to individuals that and only 
that which they can perform more advantageously than 
the State. 

That government cannot be pronounced unjust which 
takes nothing from the individual without public necessity 
on the one hand, and without rendering a proper equiva- 
lent on the other. And this necessity exists in every free 
government in regard to schools ; and this compensation 
for taxes is made in the security and general welfare of 
society. It is a great advantage to a citizen to live in 
the peaceful enjoyment of all the means of individual, 
domestic, and social happiness and prosperity provided 
by an enlightened, provident, and well-ordered State ; 
and for all this it is but just that he should bear his part 
of the public burden. Nor is it necessary, as is sometimes 
supposed, that every measure adopted by the State should 
be equally favorable to every individual. If one be less 
benefited than others by a certain legislative act, he will, 
in turn, be more benefited than they by some other act. 
Most laws operate with some degree of inequality. If, 
then. Public Schools are not directly of the same utility 
to all, and yet indirectly benefit all in a broader sense, 
there is no more injustice in taxing the people for their 
support than there is in doing the same for other kindred 
objects respecting which there is no dispute. The postal 
service, the improvement of harbors, the removal of 
obstructions to navigation from rivers ; the construction 



7 

of canals, roads, and bridges ; humane and charitable 
institutions, and the public works of cities, and police 
regulations, — all favor some classes of citizens more than 
others ; and yet no one pronounces the laws providing 
for them unjust. Perhaps no law passed " for promoting 
the public welfare " operates more equally for the good 
of all than that for educating the children of the State. 

There are no such absolute rights of property as ex- 
empt citizens either legally or morally from reasonable 
taxation. The power of a State to tax is inherent and as 
universal as the power to govern. The only consideration 
that is left is, whether the necessities and interests of a 
State are such as to justify the exercise of this power in 
the establishment of schools. That question has been sor 
often and so thoroughly argued elsewhere that it need 
not be discussed here, except incidentally as we proceed. 

Another objection has been stated in the following 
words: "I object to this system, always and necessarily 
tending to uniformity, because it violates the law of na- 
ture, which is the law of God." But every human being 
has much in common with others, while he has some 
things peculiar to himself. Of what is individual and 
peculiar, some things are blemishes, others excellences. 
Now, to speak in the same manner and in the same spirit 
of things so diverse, is not very philosophical. What is 
common to all requires of the educator common treat- 
ment. What is faulty needs to be obliterated, as far as 
possible. Peculiar qualities which are good should have 
a normal development. 

A child, so far as he is rational, participates in the 
universal reason. An appeal to this is, in its nature, the 
same in all persons, adapted only to their age and 
attainments. Every mind in a class made up of such 



8 



pupils needs to be held to a common standard. It has 
been proved, by innumerable examples, that a boy 
educated in this way has more mental power and versa- 
tility than one trained by himself. Having a common 
interest with others, he is aroused by sympathy. The 
action of the class on his mind is as valuable to him as 
the instructions of his teacher. The faculty of reason has 
freer play and becomes more many-sided. His whole 
mental development is less abnormal, and injurious 
idiosyncrasies are thrown into the background, as they 
should be. Education in the direction of universal or 
abstract reason is like the centripetal force in the solar 
system ; that in the direction of individual peculiarities 
is like the centrifugal force. The former tends to unity ; 
the latter to separation and isolation. The best training 
of the mind is that which begins with the individual 
where it finds him, and from that point starts in the 
direction of absolute truth and reason. The individuality 
will always assert itself as a positive force, and the prog- 
ress made towards absolute perfection will give the best 
possible development to a healthy individuality. Let me 
illustrate : There is but one Model Man for humanity, 
and all men are required to imitate him. The Scriptures 
give us no caution against imitating him too perfectly 
for fear of producing a " monotonous uniformity." The 
individuality will take care of itself. There will not only 
be variety enough, but it will be of the right kind ; it will 
not be abnormal. The Apostle of Love and the Apostle 
of the Gentiles were more alike for being disciples of 
Christ ; but they not only preserve their individuality, but 
they both have a far better individuality for their common 
discipleship. Thus the two factors, a difTerent starting- 
point and a common goal, ever approximated but never 



reached, are both necessary to that variety which God 
designed. Such is the law both of Christianity and of 
nature. But we are concerned with this broad principle 
only so far as it applies to Public Schools. 

First, as to the pupils. They are usually in school 
only six hours a day, for four or five months of the year, 
between the ages of about seven or eight and fifteen or 
sixteen, leaving a plenty of time for the development of 
their individuality. While in school, their normal indi- 
viduality will be preserved ; only faulty and repulsive 
peculiarities, blemishes, and weaknesses will be, as far 
as possible, weeded out. The different schools and 
grades of schools are under different teachers. 

In the second place, uniformity in those simple ele- 
ments of knowledge usually taught in the Common 
School is desirable. Let all the children resemble each 
other as much as possible in their knowledge of the 
powers of the letters of the alphabet and of numbers ; 
of orthography and pronunciation ; of the meaning of 
words and the grammatical structure of sentences ; of 
penmanship, punctuation, and the use of capitals ; of the 
fundamental rules of arithmetic, and of the elements of 
physical and political geography. Individual peculiari- 
ties on these points are altogether too prevalent. 

If b}'" " uniformity " is meant that the schools of all the 
cities and districts will naturally be taught and disciplined 
in the same way, nothing is farther from the truth. The 
School Laws do not prescribe modes of teaching and 
discipline. The County Superintendents and Trustees 
have little or nothing in common in supervising schools. 
They act independently, so far as they act at all on these 
points, — each following his own sense of propriety. The 
teachers, on whom the character of the school in these 



lO 

respects depends, are entirely independent of each other, 
are no more " equal " than other persons. On one point, 
however, there is uniformity in the Public Schools : they 
must teach all the branches of an elementary English 
education, and each in due proportion, — which cannot 
i be said of all Private Schools. 

If the meaningr be that in the same school and in the 
same classes there is a general uniformity, the remark is 
equally applicable to academies, colleges, professional 
schools, and universities. But how does this principle 
operate in fact? For more than half a century theologi- 
cal seminaries have sent out their classes annually, and 
yet no two clergymen so educated, though the instruction 
was uniform, have preached alike. The individuality of 
lawyers and physicians, who have been educated alike, 
is just as observable. If the objector had spent a part of 
his life in Prussia, or in those States of our own country 
where for a long period the people have been educated 
in the Public Schools, he would have known that indi- 
vidualit}^ except in its repulsive forms, in those who have 
passed through them, is just as marked as it is elsewhere. 
There is, indeed, some degree of uniformity in intelli- 
gence, civility, and capacity for business. 

Thus we see what ground there is for the following 
assertion : "Now, the children of our State, in attendance 
upon the Public Schools, are daily subjected to this un- 
natural process, tending to absolute uniformity, to the 
obliteration of peculiar characteristics, and by necessity 
diminishing their capacity for happiness and usefulness. 
Upon the same Procrustean bed they must all be placed, 
lopped off when too long and stretched out when too 
short, that, if possible, the law of nature may be nullified 
and the order of God reversed." 



II 



Again, it is said : "The tendency of the system every- 
where and always is to enforced attendance." "If the 
system is to be sustained by the compulsory exactions of 
law, it must also, as a logical necessity, be sustained by 
the compulsory attendance of pupils." " In all the Ger- 
man States, in Italy, in nine States in this Union, . . . 
compulsory attendance is the law." The author of this 
statement cannot have read the School Laws of those 
States of the Union to which he here refers. His whole 
argument is framed on the false supposition that nine 
States do now, and all States finally will, require all 
children to attend the Public Schools. Not one of these 
States requires a child to do so. It is not against Private 
Schools, but against ignorance and barbarism, that they 
(and we too) are making war. Nor is it true that the 
law, in any of them, lays hold of the child, and forces 
him to disobey his parents, dragging him to the Public 
School. On the contrary, it says nothing to the child, 
requires nothing of him, but lays its injunction on the 
parent, and requires him to give a minimum of education 
to his child, either in a public or private school, — enough 
to render it possible for him to become a safe and decent 
citizen. 

In taking a speculative view of the logical necessity of 
the system, the writer appears as a closet theorist, and not 
as a practical man. In a complex matter, where there are 
many co-operating causes, he takes one line of thought, 
and leaves out all the rest; and, with this one thread of 
logic, talks of logical necessity, as if the practical man 
were to proceed invariably in the narrow groove of a 
single syllogism. What may be simple and easy in 
theory may be impossible or inexpedient in practice. 
The considerate man knows that to make a law is one 



12 

thing, and to enforce it is quite another. There may be 
a logical necessity from a single point of view, and over 
against it many insurmountable obstacles from several 
practical points of view. Legislators are more swayed 
by the latter than by the former. Compulsory education, 
/'" where it really exists, has, in its real aim, sole reference 
'^ to the children of the ignorant and vicious. So far as I 
know, it is, in this country, enforced only in reference to 
them, and that, I believe, in only two or three cities. 
There is no motive to induce men to enforce such a law 
in regard to others, where the reasons of the law cease, 
but every motive to the contrary. Consequently such a 
law, even where it exists, never in practice affects the 
children of other parents. In fact, the compulsory law is 
not generally enforced at all. This writer is as sure as 
that the sun will inse to-morrow, that, if the school system 
continue to exist, compulsory attendance will be the law 
of the Commonwealth. Others, proceeding on the prin- 
ciple that laws which cannot be enforced in consequence 
of their unpopularity are as weak as tow, are just as 
certain that compulsory attendance can never prevail in 
this country. General expediency, not a syllogism, will 
decide the question. If there be such a law, it will not 
reach those parents who give any reasonable degree of 
education to their children, and it will do more good 
than harm to others who do not give their children any 
education. If there be no such law, we must deal with the 
ignorant as we always have done, relying on those moral 
agencies which have been employed by ail the States 
from the beginning, and which are still the reliance of 
nearly all of them. The point now at issue is not that 
of compulsory attendance. We have nothing to do with 
that subject in these States. The true question now 



13 

\ t 
before the people is, "Shall we make a fair trial with our\ 

present system of education, or shall we abandon it out 

of regard to the objectionable features of another and . 

different system? " \y 

Reasoning from the monarchical States of Germany 
and Italy to the republican States of this country, in re- 
gard to compulsory attendance, is not very logical. The 
stringent authority of government is congenial to the 
sentiments and habits of the people in the one case, and 
uncongenial in the other. No inference, therefore, can 
be drawn from the practice of the former to that of the 
latter. 

Assuming that compulsory attendance (which is by no 
means the same as the enforced education of neglected 
children) will be universal in these free States, the ob- 
jector to Public Schools goes on to say: "Now compul- 
sory attendance upsets the reciprocal relations and duties 
of parent and child, as God has defined and imposed 
them, and is, z'pso facto^ a negation of God's authority. 
By the system, the child is not in the hands of his parents, 
but of the State. He is to be taught such subjects as the 
State prescribes ; his manners, his health, his politics, 
his morals, even his religion, are all subject to State 
control. The child belongs to society, and not to his 
parents." He then appeals to the Bible : " Honor thy 
father and mother;" "Children, obey your parents in 
all things ;" "Ye, fathers, bring up your children in the 
nurture and admonition of the Lord." He adds, finally : 
"Shall the child, in obedience to his parents, as God 
requires, stay at home and violate the law? or, shall he 
go in obedience to the law, and disregard his parents, 
which God forbids ? " 

It is, no doubt, the Divine plan for parents to give /^ 



H 

personally religious instruction and home discipline and 
training to their children ; but it is not the Divine plan 
that parents should be their children's schoolmasters. 

Teaching must be a business, a profession ; and we 
are no more required to teach our own children in the 
studies of the schools than we are to make their shoes, 
Nor is it true that instruction given by others in spelling, 
reading, writing, arithmetic, geography, and grammar 
— the principal studies taught in the Public Schools — 
interferes, in any way, with parental duty or authority. 
The parent who sends his children to these schools can 
teach them what the Bible requires quite as well as the 
one who does not. Besides, fathers are the very men 
most likely to lead in all public measures for schools. 
There is no party in the State whose interests can in- 
duce them, or whose power could avail them, to force 
upon the collective body of parents a system of educa- 
tion against their will. The idea is wholly preposterous. 

The law, in a few States, requires the parent to see 
that his children are, for a period of about twelve weeks 
in the year, instructed either in a public school or else- 
where. Parents, with comparatively few exceptions, 
thankfully accept the boon of Free Schools, and comply 
with the requirement. These are all the facts from which 
an attempt is made to prove that the child is forced to 
violate a law of God. 

In regard to the principle so confidently laid down, 
vi£, that the State cannot, in any thing, without impiety, 
abridge the parent's authority over the child, I would 
remark that there is another passage of Scripture which 
. seems to have been forgotten : " Let every soul be subject 
unto the higher powers." Here both parent and child 
are required to be subject to the powers that be, because 



15 

they are ordained of God. By Divine appointment, the 
authority of the civil government is superior to that of 
the parent. The will of the parent must, in the last 
resort, yield to the w^ill of the government. The govern- 
ment is so important to society, to which the family is 
only preparatory and ancillary, that the family must be 
subject to its authority. The child belongs as much to 
society as to the family, and for a much longer period. 
He is protected by the government against the cruelty 
of the parent. If he violate a law, the parent cannot 
protect him by interposing his authority. If the State 
needs the military services of a youth of eighteen years, 
the parent cannot resist. If the small-pox prevails, and 
a city orders that all the children shall be vaccinated, the 
parent cannot say the child is under my control. If a 
ship in which he sails is put in quarantine, the father 
cannot command his son to come home. All this is as 
scriptural as it is rational. 

In all civil matters, therefore, parental authority is 
limited by the exigencies or perils of the State. This 
law is as applicable to education as it is to any other 
subject. The question, then, is not whether the State 
can lawfully and scripturally interpose in the education 
of children, but whether its exigencies or perils are really 
so great as to demand and justify the interposition. To 
draw the line is, indeed, a delicate matter. But of the 
principle of State interposition, whenever it is expedient, 
neither Scripture, nor reason, nor analogy allows us to 
doubt. / 

It is said that, by the theory of Public Schools, "the 
State stands to the children iti loco parentis.'''' The 
Public School system rests on no such doctrine as that. 
No such principle is recognized in the School Laws. 



^/12 



i6 



The State stands in its own place, and leaves the parent 
in his. For its own sake, it aids the parent in training 
up his children to become good citizens, well knowing 
that, without such aid, a multitude of children will be 
neglected and become its worst enemies. This is the 
theory adopted by every State. It does not propose to 
bestow a bounty upon individuals, as such, nor to 
interfere with the liberty and just rights of the parent. 
Such complaints do not come from parents who have 
lived under this beneficent system, but from men who, 
without experience or observation, theorize in the closet 
on the subject. The people are beginning to see that 
they have a deep stake in this matter ; that they are 
immensely benefited as well as the State ; that by this 
means, and no other, can they educate every child without 
difficulty. When they have once enjoyed the blessing 
of Free Schools they almost universally open their eyes 
to all the great realities of the case, and give up their old 
prejudices. They regard these schools as their own, 
and glory in them as the "people's colleges." Are not 
Public Schools more controlled by the popular will than 
any others? Teachers are selected and schools controlled 
by those whom the legal voters, mostly parents, elect for 
this purpose. How is the teacher appointed in a Private 
School? Do forty or fifty parents individually make the 
contract, and does each one exercise his parental authority 
in settling the course of study, the text-books, and the rules 
of discipline? It is well known that the best Private 
Schools in the South are academies with preparatory de- 
partments ; and that these are managed, not by the parents 
of the children, but by boards of trustees. Parents may 
patronize them or not ; they can exercise no control over 
them. Other Private Schools are set up and governed by 



17 

the principal according to his own ideas ; and he, if he be 
a man, will suffer no dictation in his own chosen profession. 
The parent must put up with such a teacher as others ap- 
prove. There is often no choice between this and going 
without a school, on account of the impracticability of main- 
taining two schools in the same place. Practically, the 
whole matter is managed by a few leaders, the people fol- 
lowing ; and it is just as safe to have those leaders regularly 
chosen by the people as to have them self-appointed. What 
has been so often said about individual parental control has 
no place in any respectable Private School ; and is true 
only of family schools, which are now wholly out of date. 
A still more definite ground of complaint is presented 
thus : "The Public School, in all its departrirents,'"'ili'"an3~~n 
must be utterly irresponsible to parents. This feature, 
though the system is on its good behavior yet with us, is 
already beginning to awaken, to some extent, the public 
attention to the mischievous tendencies of the scheme. 
The punitive measures of the Public School even now 
. . . frequently do violence to our sense of justice, and 
inflict irreparable injury upon the character of the child." 
"In many cases, despite the best efforts to prevent it, 
incompetent, corrupt, brutal teachers will be appointed. 
. . . Whatever subjects may be taught, whatever manners 
encouraged, whatever morals, whatever religion, incul- 
cated, however aggrieved or wronged, we must be silent, 
acquiescent. For slight or imaginary offences, a coarse, 
vulgar teacher, vexed and goaded by cheap whiskey, may 
wreak his brutal wrath on your noble boy, your delicate, 
shrinking daughter." I quote this last passage with regret. 
Does the writer mean to affirm that the Public School 
system is less favorable to the appointment of competent 
and humane teachers than the system of Private Schools? 

3 



i8 



The State, when its system is complete, provides for the 
professional training of its teachers by means of Normal 
Schools, Teachers' Institutes, and by the visitation and 
instruction of Superintendents. Nothing has exerted a 
happier influence in improving the quality of instruction 
given than these several agencies. Every teacher is 
subjected to a careful examination by a properly qualified 
officer, before he can be lawfully appointed. Then a 
selection is made by another officer or Board of officers. 
Having entered upon his duties, he and his school are 
frequently visited and inspected, and compared with 
others, and if he prove unfit for his office he is dismissed. 
Can as much be said of the ordeal through which the 
private teacher is to pass? 

It is precisely at this point of wholesome and firm, but 
humane discipline, that the Public School has greatly 
the advantage over the Private School for the mass of 
children. The interference of dictatorial parents is one 
of the causes of bitterest complaint with teachers generally. 
The teacher may be made the slave of a powerful patron, 
and the proper discipline of the whole school must yield 
to the dictates of one whom it is not safe to offend. The 
parent will believe the child (the most unreliable witness) 
and not the teacher, who is treated as a culprit ; and there 
is no cool, disinterested party to settle the difficulty impar- 
tially. In the Public School, the parent goes directly to 
the Superintendent or other school officer, who is not only 
free from the excitement arising from being a party in the 
dispute, but directly and deeply interested in maintaining 
faultless discipline, both for his personal satisfaction and 
convenience and for the reputation of the schools, which 
depend wholly on popular favor. He hears the parent's 
complaint. He then goes to the teacher and endeavors to 



19 

effect an amicable settlement. If he does not succeed, 
he next lays the matter before the School Board, and the 
case is investigated and settled. There cannot be greater 
security than this, both for the school and the parent. It 
is not the child, but the parent, who should seek redress. 
There is no part of the whole system of public education 
which is more universally satisfactory, where it is in 
vigorous and healthy operation, than its equitable and 
well-ordered method of school government. 

The State employs its wisest and best men to provide -' 
good school-houses and furniture, qualified teachers, 
judicious courses of instruction, and just discipline; but '=^, ViM' 
leaves every citizen at liberty to send his children to' ^ r^ 
Private Schools of his own choice. And yet, in view of n 

these very facts, the objector says: "My soul sickens in [). jr// 
the contemplation of the terrible condition to which we -'^ 
are hastening." And what is this terrible condition? It 
is that in which a State, for its own preservation and 
welfare, and for the general good, takes care that all the 
people possess the rudiments of knowledge by the only 
means which can secure that result. The author denies 
that the State, which exists for the purpose of protecting 
person and property, has the right to protect itself and 
its citizens against ignorance, lawlessness, and violence, 
by such a preventive as teaching the people. Thieves 
and plunderers are to be so far protected in their right 
to do wrong, that they can bring up their children to be 
like themselves ; and the evil must not be touched by the 
State till it is past remedy, and is then to be visited with 
penalties. Little culprits are around our premises every 
day, with no occupation but pilfering ; and yet it is not 
allowed to put them in school, and make useful citizens 
of them ; but they are to be left to grow up, in swarms, 



20 



as pests of society. In some places which are in just 
this condition good citizens are removing to other States ; 
and how is this exodus to be arrested? By emigration 
societies? Public Schools will furnish a surer and better 
remedy. This is a practical question, and the sooner 
we meet it the better. If we deny the right of the State 
to protect itself in this way, the evil can never be 
removed. England has, from the time of the Heptarchy, 
tried the experiment of checking it by Private Schools at 
an expense that is perfectly enormous, and now confesses 
that it is a total failure ; and is driven to the expedient of 
Public Schools by the appalling mass of ignorance that 
is growing upon its hands, and endangering the stability 
of the government. No other State on either side of the 
Atlantic will ever lavish so much money as England has 
lavished upon Private Schools. The experiment failing 
there, I see no chance for its success in any other country. 
Prussia, on the other hand, has educated her people as 
no other State has done ; and the consequence is that, 
in proportion to its population, it is the most enlightened, 
influential, and powerful people on the globe. And yet 
universal education is vastly more necessary to a republic 
than to a monarchy. Free Schools have been longer 
maintained in republics than in monarchies. For more 
than two centuries have they existed in some of our own 
States ; and no tax has been paid more cheerfully by 
them than the school tax. By no amount of argument 
could they be induced to cut off* this right hand of their 
strength. The whole population think they receive un- 
told blessings in the form of a prevalent public spirit, 
orderly and peaceable citizenship, general intelligence, 
enterprise, wealth, liberality, security of person and 
property, activity and energy in church and State, in 



21 



comparison with which a school tax of a few dollars is 
as nothing. If the fears entertained by some are just, 
why have they not been realized in this long and wide- 
spread experience ? Why does not some nation, State, 
or city, which has given it a fair trial, abandon the 
system ? 

The failure of Private Schools /or the elementary in- 
struction of the j^eo-ple — for we are sneaking of these 
only — may be explained from their very genius, which 
is, in a multitude of important particulars, the very 
reverse of that of Public Schools. Private Schools are 
often established as a means of support, or for money- 
making, and conducted both with reference to education 
and to gain, in varying proportions. Public Schools 
are established and conducted with sole reference to the 
best and least expensive means of education. Private 
Schools are established, not in sufficient numbers nor 
where they are most needed, but where they will yield 
the greatest income. The teachers are self-appointed, 
for whose competency and jfitness no one is responsible. 
They may be good ; they may be adventurers ; they may 
be objects of charity, kept in place out of mere pity. 
The teachers lay out their own courses of instruction, 
often with the most slender provision for elementary 
studies. There is no supervision of Private Schools. 
The teacher cannot grade his school. If he instructs 
by individuals instead of classes, he can give only a few 
minutes a day to each pupil. If he instruct, as he must, 
numerous small classes, where he attempts to classify all 
his pupils, he must hurry from one subject to another 
without time for plan or preparation. He cannot safely 
be firm and impartial in his discipline. He is liable to be 
in the power of influential patrons. Teachers cannot be 



22 



distributed in numerous grades of schools on the principle 
of division of labor, each one being devoted exclusively 
to that for which he is best fitted. These, and a host of 
other disadvantages, lie not in any thing culpable in pri- 
vate teachers, but are inherent in the system as a means 
of general education. These schools exclude all S3'^ste- 
matic arrangement among themselves, by being wholly 
independent of each other and disconnected. We are 
ready to do all honor to individuals, societies, and 
churches by whose benevolent agency Private Schools 
have been provided for the destitute. Some of these are 
doing a work which will be held in grateful remembrance 
by succeeding generations. Private Schools of various 
kinds have their appropriate place among the means of 
education. But they are an unsafe reliance for the uni- 
versal diffusion of knowledge, and lack the elements of 
economy and efficiency which characterize the Public 
Schools. 

If we are to believe in the theory set forth in the vari- 
ous articles under review, it is well for the State to appro- 
priate funds for the endowment and support of the highest 
institutions of learning for the education of the few, but 
not to appropriate one cent for those schools which offer 
elementary education for all the people. It is well for 
the State to encourage emigration societies and agents, 
but not Free Schools ; though these attract, not the scum 
of European society, but families of wealth and culture. 
It is well for the public to tax itself for railroads, but not 
for schools, though the latter increase the population and 
Jhe value of property as certainly as the former. It is well 
to pay enormously for a little doubtful legislation and a 
great deal of party strife and contention, but it is tyranny 
to go to the root of the evil, and, by such means as 



.V 



23 

public instruction, to educate the people up to the point 
of giving their votes to none but competent and good 
men, and thus healing this running sore of the nation. 
It is well to pay high rates of tuition, which shall exclude 
the majority of children, perhaps, from the schools, in 
order to place our children, for a few hours of the day, 
where they shall not come in contact with the children 
of others ; and yet monstrous for the public (which alone 
can do it) to educate, improve, and refine all the chil- 
dren in the streets and about our doors, so that contact 
with them (which in most cases is inevitable) shall 
endanger no child's morals or manners. 

It is furthermore objected that "education would t-^ 
be, to the mere operatives certainly, a positive disqualifi- 
cation . . by arousing ambitions which must be for ever 
crushed ; " that the progress of society would be retarded 
by universal education, because " civilization ceases 
without scavengers, boot-blacks," &c. To show that it is 
sin for such persons to better their conditions, the passage 
is quoted, "Let every man abide in the same calling 
wherein he is called." And, to make the matter still 
more sure, it is added, " God visits the iniquity of the 
fathers upon the children ; " " The child, by God's ap- 
pointment, inherits the physical, moral, and intellectual 
characteristics of its parents." The conclusion is, "Our 
modern fanaticism is wiser than God." 

It is needless to comment upon these obvious perver- 
sions of Scripture ; but it is natural to inquire what the 
people of Scotland, of Switzerland, of all the German 
States, and, we may add, nearly, if not quite, all the 
States of the Union, do for scavengers, boot-blacks, and 
operatives of every description, if the education of these 
classes unfits them for their occupation. We have ob- 



24' 

served but one effect in this regard, — the increase of 
their wages. The universal testimony of employers is 
that the value of service, even of the lowest grade, is in 
proportion to the intelligence of those employed. What 
a calamity it is for a human being to be shut out, not only 
from profitable employment, but from the light of the 
sacred Scriptures, and of all books, and for the soul that 
was made for knowledge and culture to remain almost a 
blank ! How dreary the life, and how low the pleasures 
of one who can never taste the sweets of literature, nor 
know what is going on in the wide world, in this age of 
wonders, beyond the narrow limits of his own town or 
district ! As surely as States come under Christian in- 
fluence, and pursue an enlightened policy, the children 
of the degraded and dangerous classes will not be left to 
the sad inheritance of their fathers' ignorance, crime, 
and ignominy. The human heart revolts at the idea that 
men are not to be helped out of their wretchedness, even 
for the public good, on the ground that Providence would 
not have it so. The humanizing influences of the age, 
felt in every civilized State, come not, as is implied, from 
impiety, but from the divine precepts and example of 
the Great Teacher and Exemplar of religion and virtue. 
Another paradoxical view is advanced. The argument 
that public intelligence is necessary to free institutions is 
pronounced to be "entirely unsatisfactory," and then we 
are informed that " there is a vast amount of cheap hum- 
bug about this matter of education," and that the education 
which a citizen needs is not given in the Public Schools. 
"The mere ability to read, write, and cipher, a smattering 
of geography and grammar, of history and science, is not 
education, and seldom prepares a boy for the intelligent 
and conscientious discharge of the duties of citizenship." 



25 

"The best school which human wit ever devised for 
political instruction was our old county court system, 
where the sovereigns every month, however untaught in 
books, learned from the lips of eloquent orators and 
statesmen the history and nature of their government, the 
aims and tactics of rival parties, and received the ablest 
instruction in the rights and duties of citizenship. In this 
way intelligent citizens were made, though they did not, 
and many of them could not, read the newspapers." 1 
am afraid that, in the changes that have taken place, that 
race of politicians — great orators, statesmen, and patriots 
— have deserted the county courts, if they have not, like 
those times of ignorance, passed away. Besides, the 
question at issue is not whether one, while a boy, and 
while at school, or even when he is through with his 
school, is "fitted for civic offices," but whether his power 
to read and understand will, when he has exercised it in 
his manhood, place him in intelligence above his neighbor 
who has not this power? 

Suppose some men are brighter without education than 
others are with it, how is the writer to make it out that 
the bright intellects are always with the illiterate, and the 
dull ones always with the educated classes? With the 
same capacities, and with tlie same opportunities for 
growth and development in practical and public life, will 
it be maintained that the educated boy has no advantages 
over the uneducated? If not, the argument is entirely 
sophistical. Knowledge and discipline are given in the 
schools ; practical and political knowledge follows the 
schools, and comes of itself and with increased power in 
the advance to manhood and maturer years. The school 
gives the elements of power ; life gives direction and J' 
development to that power. 

4 



26 



Suppose the illiterate can learn many things by 
observation, by intercourse with better-informed men. 
Do they enjoy the monopoly of these opportunities? Can 
they observe better, reflect more, judge more accurately, 
and reason more logically than those who have at the 
start disciplined intellects, exercised memories, and 
minds stored with elementary principles, and with varied 
knowledge? Does an excursion in geography beyond 
the horizon of one's own home, and in history farther 
back than the days of one's grandfather, and a famil- 
iarity with the thoughts of the great English writers, and 
the enjoyment ai'ising from the perusal of the daily, 
weekly, monthly, and quarterly press, unfit him for 
competition with those of his fellow-citizens who are 
destitute of all these things, and to whom the literature 
of the world is a blank? 

If the argument against the necessity of "book learn- 
ing" for the citizen is good, it is as applicable to private 
as to public schools. But who would be so mad as to 
propose that all these be closed, and the youth be suffered 
to grow up as ignorant as barbarians ; and, in their ig- 
norance, prejudice, and passion, to drink in the sentiments 
of corrupt party politicians, and to depend on such an 
education as a preparation for the duties of citizenship? 

There are those who protest against the payment of 
taxes "for the education of the children of worthless 
vagabonds." They would set these children to work in 
clearing up the swamps that breed malaria. Such per- 
sons, of course, must think it cheaper, wiser, and better 
to leave them, under the sanction of Heaven and of just 
laws, in their hereditary condition of vice and misery 
than to educate them, though the contagion of which 
they complain spread like the leprosy, though theft and 



27 

robbery and bloodshed and slaughter outgrow all legal 
restraints and remedial measures ; though such of their 
number as are detected and punished only become worse 
and more desperate by incarceration ; and, finally, though 
the " taxation wrung from an unwilling people " for de- 
tecting, trying, imprisoning, and supporting them in 
penitentiaries be much greater and more oppressive than 
would be necessary to educate them all in their youth, 
and save them and us from one of the greatest curses 
which now afflict society. 

As to putting young children.into the field at the age 
which the laws of nature have set apart for education, 
and thereby dooming them to perpetual ignorance, it is 
as preposterous as it would be to attempt to reap when 
we ought to sow. It is as impossible to reap in seed- 
time as it is absurd to sow in harvest-time. This is not the 
way to rid ourselves of "the brute tyranny of numbers." 
We cannot recall the right of suffrage, and yet that right 
will prove a curse unless its exercise be guided by intel- 
ligence. We must be for ever where we now are, or in 
a worse condition, unless we educate. Therefore, with 
Washington, Jefferson, and Madison, I say educate, 
educate, educate ! There is no use in ignoring our 
perilous circumstances. Do not let the State refuse to 
save itself simply because in so doing it also improves, 
elevates, and saves individuals. To brand this as 
" Quixotic philanthropy " is easy, indeed ; but it is no 
mark of wisdom. 

I will close this discussion by indicating, in the briefest 
manner, a line of argument that is purely practical. It is 
well known that in all the Southern, and especially the 
Gulf States, good lands can be purchased for a moiety of 
their former value. This condition of property is, no doubt, 



i 



28 

produced by many causes. But men who have offered to 
sell their plantations even at a much lower rate in the far 
South, have given as the chief reason the insecurity of 
property in fences, fruits, produce in the field, and all the 
smaller stock of a farm, arising from the depredations of a 
low and ignorant population. The pilfering propensities/ 
of this class of people are, indeed, quite insufferable. 
Let good schools be planted in all these districts, and, in 
less than ten years, when the pupils shall have reached 
their maturity, the whole condition of things will be 
changed. Again, the system of slave labor being abolished, 
and that of free labor substituted, it becomes necessary 
to qualify men for their new condition' by giving them 
intelligence enough to be their own masters. Freedom of 
itself does not make one an intell igent and useful citizen. 
This question of labor can never be properly adjusted with 
an ignorant people of blind impulses. They will sport with 
their liberty to their own injury and that of their employers. 
Nor is it for this class alone that Public Schools are neces- 
sary. Such are the improvements in the industrial arts, 
and such the competition in all branches of business in the 
same and in different sections of the country, that men who 
are far behind others in intelligence and skill will stand no 
equal chance with them. Agri'culture is now the leading 
occupation of men in the South. That it is generally in a 
low condition, that only a part of the soil is under cultiva- 
tion, and that not in the most economical way, is confessecfl 
by all. The more thorough cultivation of small tracts of ^ 
land, a greater variety of crops, with a proper rotation, and 
a system of sub-soiling, manuring, and draining, would not 
only be more profitable, but would greatly improve the soil. 
But all this presupposes a more intelligent class of laborers.~^ 
A still greater advantage would accrue from the introduction 
-J of manufactures. Raising only one or two kinds of crops. 




29 

depending chiefly on bulky raw materials to be transported 
at the present high rates, and paying for their return in 
the form of manufactured articles, not only subjects men 
to all the risks of a bad season at home, or of reduced profits 
if the season is good abroad, but it burdens them with 
disproportionate expenses, and leaves them without the 
prosperity resulting from a multiplication of the branches 
of business which places producer and consumer side by 
side. Now we must either renounce all these essential 
means of prosperity, or we must educate the mass of the 
people up to that point of intelligence which will render 
the skilful practice of all the industrial arts possible. The\ 
Private Schools will never reach the great body of the-^ 
laboring classes. They are limited, sporadic, and devoid 
of all organization and system. Contrast with them the 
Public Schools both in efficiency and in the scope, order, 
and economy of their operations. In the first place, there 
is a complete organization of school districts, school funds, 
and of school officers. All the parts of the State receive 
equal attention in proportion to their population. The 
whole working of the system is in the hands of men chosen 
from among all the people for their skill in the busipLCss "^ 
of education. The highest educational talent of the State 
is placed at the head of the system. Others of similar 
character constitute the State Board of Education. The 
best assistants that can be obtained are sought for as 
county superintendents. The fittest men in each district 
are selected as local school officers. All these, each in his 
appropriate sphere, act in concert on the same general plan. 
It is also to be remembered that the schools themselves 
are organized and duly graded. Teaching becomes a * 
profession, with a system of promotions that secures 
permanency in the office. Normal Schools and Teachers' 
Institutes train persons for this special work. Thus the 



30 

system, as such, is complete in all its parts, and has the 
economical advantages which characterize all great and 
successful business enterprises, by means of combination, 
organization, and supervision. 

This is the theory. We do not assert that the ideal is ever 
fully reached in practice. School officers and school men 
share in the infirmities common to all. Least of all do we 
maintain that a new system will, at the begiiinvtg, bring 
forth all its legitimate fruits. All that we assert — and the 
experience of more than thirty States bears us out in the 
assertion — is that, wherever sufficient time and opportunity 
have been given, the ideal has been reasonably approximated 
first in the cities, and next in the country. 















^s» > • •:> j> -_:s> :3> ~ 
:«»> >> ■ :> _z> "3> :^> ' : 
:«*- > ■> > i> z» ^3> .:s> ^:* 



► :>>2> 






r>,..7P>y •:>0 ^^)^ 






3> .^ '.> ^5> -^^^O a521 

> o ^;^ 0->;S3| 

'■"-^ >>3> J>> \^ 
■'3 S>Z> ^3> , 



> D 



> i> 






3 :> » > 



'-^..5> .^;^ 


















3,> ':>.^-. :> 

> >>) 0;> >:, ;-> 
^■)~5 ■'>> >> "> 









^r>_E>^> 1>;>-^ 









»^i> J3>:s> 









j>:3» >> 















>2»5> ->v. 

>.3>5> >i 






> :>>^>3>a 





















«>^^ ,::> //^>' ^'3>'^ ::3^'ii> _:»52> :z> 5I>^::^:>2^5>;' 
^>2>■>• _2>>2>s»: ■ jas>:>iq:>' ■>3>;'j>> . r:>v^i> £:»,2cx> i:>;?S>> j3P>5ai^:a»': 

^>_^ ^ r^^> .:^i^-r>- ;':»2> .>5:>v52> -09 32> ^3> ^>2>^ .^ >'3^»'i>' 









^::»^->03fe^^ 









-'.^-:I^.^;>0 y>> --^ -^'^ 



>i>_r» 



5»::r3r3 









^^ ^^ >: 

'^-^>y> 3>>S^> -^v >if• 
^D..~^w^^"-^^2> .rJGJB^ • ^::S.■ 


















>Z3l»,3S> 



l,i%»4:^^»3>.:^ifr 



